Читать книгу John Marvel, Assistant - Thomas Nelson Page - Страница 11

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My career at college promised at one time after that to be almost creditable, but it ended in nothing. I was not a good student, because, I flattered myself, I was too good a fellow. I loved pleasure too much to apply myself to work, and was too self-indulgent to deny myself anything. I despised the plodding ways of cold-blooded creatures like Peck even more than I did the dullness of John Marvel. Why should I delve at Latin and Greek and Mathematics when I had all the poets and novelists. I was sure that when the time came I could read up and easily overtake and surpass the tortoise-like monotony of Peck's plodding. I now and then had an uneasy realization that Peck was developing, and that John Marvel, to whom I used to read Latin, had somehow come to understand the language better than I. However, this was only an occasional awakening, and the idea was too unpleasant for me to harbor it long. Meantime, I would enjoy myself and prepare to bear off the more shining honors of the orator and society-medalist.

At the very end I did, indeed, arouse myself, for I had a new incentive. I fell in love. Toward the mid-session holiday the place always filled up with pretty girls. Usually they came just after "the exams"; but occasionally some of them came a little in advance: those who were bent on conquest. At such times, only cold anchorites like Marvel, or calculating machines like Peck, stuck to their books. Among the fair visitants this year was one whose reputation for beauty had already preceded her: Miss Lilian Poole. She was the daughter of a banker in the capital of the State, and by all accounts was a tearing belle. She had created a sensation at the Mardi Gras the year before, and one who could do that must be a beauty. She was reported more beautiful than Isabelle Henderson, the noted beauty of the Crescent city, whom she was said to resemble. Certainly, she was not lacking in either looks or intelligence; for those who had caught a glimpse of her, declared her a Goddess. I immediately determined that I would become her cavalier for the occasion. And I so announced to the dozen or more fellows who composed our set. They laughed at me.

"Why, you do not know her."

"But I shall know her."

"You are not on speaking terms with Professor Sterner"—the Professor of Mathematics at whose house she was stopping. The Professor, a logarithmic machine, and I had had a falling out not long before. He had called on me for a recitation, one morning after a dance, and I had said, "I am not prepared, sir."

"You never are prepared," he said, which the class appeared to think amusing. He glanced over the room.

"Mr. Peck."

Peck, also, had been at the dance the night before, though he said he had a headache, and caused much amusement by his gambols and antics, which, were like those of a cow; I therefore expected him to say, "unprepared" also. But not so.

"I was unwell last night, sir."

"Ah! Well, I am glad, at least, that you have some sort of a legitimate excuse."

I flamed out and rose to my feet.

"Are you alluding to me, sir?"

"Take your seat, sir. I deny your right to question me."

"I will not take my seat. I do not propose to sit still and be insulted. I demand an answer to my question."

"Take your seat, I say. I will report you to the Faculty," he shouted.

"Then you will have to do so very quickly; for I shall report you immediately." And with that, I stalked out of the room. The Faculty met that afternoon and I laid my complaint before them, and as the students, knowing the inside facts, took my side, the Faculty held that the Professor committed the first breach and reprimanded us both. I was well satisfied after I had met and cut the Professor publicly.

I now acknowledge the untowardness of the situation; but when the boys laughed, I pooh-poohed it.

"I do not speak to old Sterner, but I will speak to her the first time I meet her."

"I will bet you do not," cried Sam Pleasants.

"Supper for the crowd," chimed in several. They were always as ready to bet as their long-haired ancestors were in the German forests, where they bet themselves away, and kept their faith, to the amazement of a Roman gentleman, who wrote, "istam vocant fidem."

We were all in a room, the windows of which looked across the lawn toward the pillared portico of Professor Sterner's house, and some of the boys were gazing over toward the mansion that sheltered the subject of our thoughts. And as it happened, at that moment, the door opened and out stepped the young lady herself, in a smart walking costume, topped by a large hat with a great, drooping, beguiling, white ostrich feather. An exclamation drew us all to the window.

"There she is now!" Without doubt, that was she.

"Jove! What a stunner!"

"She is alone. There is your chance."

"Yes, this is the first time you have seen her; now stop jawing and play ball."

"Or pay up."

"Yes, supper for the crowd: porterhouse steak; chicken, and waffles to end with."

So they nagged me, one and all.

"Done," I said, "I will do it now."

"You have never seen her before?"

"Never." I was arranging my tie and brushing my hair.

"You swear it?"

But I hurried out of the door and slammed it behind me.

I turned down the walk that led across the campus to the point whither Miss Poole was directing her steps, and I took a gait that I judged should meet her at the intersection of the walks. I was doing some hard thinking, for I knew the window behind me was crowded with derisive faces.

As I approached her, I cut my eye at her, and a glance nearly overthrew my resolution. She was, indeed, a charming picture as she advanced, though I caught little more than a general impression of a slim, straight, statuesque figure, a pink face, surmounted by a profusion of light hair, under a big hat with white feathers, and a pair of bluish eyes. I glanced away, but not before she had caught my eye. Just then a whistle sounded behind me, and my nerve returned. I suddenly quickened my pace, and held out my hand.

"Why, how do you do?" I exclaimed with well-feigned surprise and pleasure, plumping myself directly in front of her. She paused; looked at me, hesitated, and then drew back slightly.

"I think—, I—. You have made a mistake, I think."

"Why, do you not remember Henry Glave? Is this not Miss Belle Henderson?" I asked in a mystified way.

"No, I am not Miss Henderson."

"Oh! I beg your pardon—I thought—" I began. Then, as I moved back a little, I added, "Then you must be Miss Lilian Poole; for there cannot be more than two like you on earth. I beg your pardon."

I backed away.

"I am," she said. Her mounting color showed that she was at least not angry, and she gave proof of it.

"Can you tell me? Is not that the way to Dr. Davis's house?"

"Yes—I will show you which it is." My manner had become most respectful.

"Oh! Don't trouble yourself, I beg you."

"It is not the least trouble," I said sincerely, and it was the only truth I had told. I walked back a few steps, hat in hand, pointing eagerly to the house. And as I left, I said, "I hope you will pardon my stupid mistake."

"Oh! I do not think it stupid. She is a beauty."

"I think so." I bowed low. I saw the color rise again as I turned away, much pleased with myself, and yet a good deal ashamed, too.

When I returned to "the lair," as we termed Sam Pleasants's room, the boys seized me. They were like howling dervishes. But I had grown serious. I was very much ashamed of myself. And I did the only decent thing I could—I lied, or as good as lied.

"I will give the supper if you will stop this yelling. Do you suppose I would make a bet about a girl I did not know?"

This took the spirit out of the thing, and only one of them knew the truth. Marvel, who was present, looked at me seriously, and that night said to me half sadly,

"You ought not to have done that."

"What? I know it. It was an ungentlemanly thing."

"I do not mean that. You ought not to have told a story afterward."

How he knew it I never knew.

But I had gotten caught in my own mesh. I had walked into the little parlor without any invitation, and I was soon hopelessly entangled in the web at which I had hitherto scoffed. I fell violently in love.

I soon overcame the little difficulty that stood in my way. And, indeed, I think Miss Lilian Poole rather helped me out about this. I did not allow grass to grow under my feet, or any impression I had made to become effaced. I quickly became acquainted with my Diana-like young lady; that is, to speak more exactly, I got myself presented to her, for my complete acquaintance with her was of later date, when I had spent all the little patrimony I had. I saw immediately that she knew the story of the wager, though she did not at that time refer to it, and so far as I could tell, she did not resent it. She, at least, gave no sign of it. I asked her to allow me to escort her to a German, but she had an engagement.

"Who is it?" I inquired rather enviously.

She had a curious expression in her eyes—which, by the way, were a cool blue or gray, I never could be sure which, and at times looked rather like steel.

She hesitated a moment and her little mouth drew in somewhat closely.

"Mr. Peck." Her voice was a singular instrument. It had so great a compass and possessed some notes that affected me strangely; but it also could be without the least expression. So it was now when she said, "Mr. Peck," but she colored slightly, as I burst out laughing.

"Peck! Pecksniff? Did you ever see him dance? I should as soon have thought of your dancing with a clothes-horse."

She appeared somewhat troubled.

"Does he dance so badly as that? He told me he danced."

"So he does—like this." I gave an imitation of Peck's gyrations, in which I was so earnest that I knocked over a table and broke a fine lamp, to my great consternation.

"Well, you are realistic," observed Miss Poole, calmly, who struck me as not so much concerned at my misfortune as I might have expected. When, however, she saw how really troubled I was, she was more sympathetic.

"Perhaps, if we go out, they will not know who did it," she observed.

"Well, no, I could not do that," I said, thinking of Peck, and then as her expression did not change, I fired a shot that I meant to tell. "Peck would do that sort of thing. I shall tell them."

To this she made no reply. She only looked inscrutably pretty. But it often came back to me afterward how calmly and quite as a matter of course she suggested my concealing the accident, and I wondered if she thought I was a liar.

She had a countenance that I once thought one of the most beautiful in the world; but which changed rarely. Its only variations were from an infantile beauty to a statuesque firmness.

Yet that girl, with her rather set expression and infantile face, her wide open, round eyes and pink prettiness, was as deep as a well, and an artesian well at that.

I soon distanced all rivals. Peck was quickly disposed of; though, with his nagging persistence, he still held on. This bored me exceedingly and her too, if I could judge by her ridicule of him and her sarcasm which he somehow appeared too stupid to see. He succumbed, however, to my mimicry of his dancing; for I was a good mimic, and Peck, in a very high collar and with very short trousers on his dumpy legs, was really a fair mark. Miss Poole was by no means indifferent to public opinion, and a shaft of satire could penetrate her mail of complacency. So when she returned later to the classic shades of the university, as she did a number of times for Germans and other social functions, I made a good deal of hay. A phrase of Peck's, apropos of this, stuck in my memory. Some one—it was, I think, Leo Wolffert—said that I appeared to be making hay, and Peck said, "Yes, I would be eating it some day." I often wondered afterward how he stumbled on the witticism.

Those visits of my tall young dulcinea cost me dear in the sequel. While the other fellows were boning I was lounging in the drawing-room chattering nonsense or in the shade of the big trees in some secluded nook, writing her very warm poems of the character which Horace says is hated both of Gods and men. Several of these poems were published in the college magazine. The constant allusions to her physical charms caused Peck to say that I evidently considered Miss Poole to be "composed wholly of eyes and hair." His observation that a man was a fool to write silly verses to a girl he loved, because it gave her a wrong idea of her charms, I, at the time, set down to sheer envy, for Peck could not turn a rhyme; but since I have discovered that for a practical person like Peck, it has a foundation, of truth.